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“You don’t like the way we do it? Then volunteer, get involved,” Thudium said. “We’d love to have more volunteers.”

The mother of two grown daughters and grandmother to a 3-year-old boy didn’t start working as a Realtor right away. She was studying for a business degree at the University of Iowa when her husband, Shawn, got a job at Beechcraft.

“Then I went to school at Wichita State and then I had a baby, and that was it,” said Thudium, an eastern Iowa native. “I’m like a semester short (of earning her degree).

“But my husband traveled most of the time, so when my kids were young I didn’t feel like I could go (back) to school.”

When Thudium’s daughters were old enough to where she felt comfortable working outside the home, she worked in office-type jobs, including a stint at her father-in-law’s durable medical equipment business. Her duties were primarily back-office work, but not always.

“I delivered beds,” she said. “I did whatever I had to do.”

She would continue that track when her husband was hired by IBM, and they were sent to St. Louis.

How did you get into real estate?

“When we moved back here (from St. Louis) a friend of mine who sold me my house said, ‘Dwyn, you’d be good in real estate. You ought to get your license.’ So I did.”

What agency did you start with as a Realtor?

“The same company. Crown III.”

But your first foray as a Realtor didn’t last long, did it?

“Shawn traveled four weeks out of four weeks. And it just did not work out with my family.

“The office manager job at Crown III came available so I became the office manager. Jim Miner (the firm’s founder who co-owned it with Margie Zwiesler) was a wonderful mentor. I learned a lot from him.”

How much time do you think you will spend weekly serving as WAAR president?

“I’m making him (RJ Marshall, WAAR’s CEO) give me a parking space downstairs. I’ve read it’s six to 10 hours a month. I bet it’s more than that, though.”

What are your goals for your one-year term as president of WAAR?

“I want to serve the membership, that’s my big goal. I feel like that’s my responsibility to satisfy or investigate issues that might be coming up so we can inform our membership. (And) I want the community to know that the Realtors are concerned about their community. That’s a huge thing.”

What do you like about the business?

“It’s an ever-changing business. No two deals are ever alike. You are constantly learning.”

“There has to be happy medium between the way it was and the way it is today. (But) it is getting better.”

You said that probably your toughest time in the real estate business was a couple of years after you bought Crown III, when the financial crisis and recession hit, causing home sales to plummet. So how did you handle that trough?

“You really, really watched your pennies. Obviously I like the real estate business because (for a while) I didn’t bring home a paycheck, all my money went into the company.”

Why did you get involved in the leadership of WAAR?

“Jim Miner encouraged me to get involved. This is your business. You want to help. You want to be involved. You want to know what’s going on.”

How is your career different than when you started?

“I’m more at ease with everything, maybe more confident in myself than 20 years ago. My agents help me every step of the way. I attribute a lot of my success to them. And they pick up the slack for me when I’m gone. They are good, good people. I wouldn’t trade them for the world.”